From Marxists Internet Archive
Karl Marx. Capital Volume One
Chapter Eight: Constant Capital and Variable Capital
The various factors of the labour-process play different parts in forming the
value of the product.
The labourer adds fresh value to the subject of his labour by expending upon
it a given amount of additional labour, no matter what the specific character
and utility of that labour may be. On the other hand, the values of the means of
production used up in the process are preserved, and present themselves afresh
as constituent parts of the value of the product; the values of the cotton and
the spindle, for instance, re-appear again in the value of the yarn. The value
of the means of production is therefore preserved, by being transferred to the
product. This transfer takes place during the conversion of those means into a
product, or in other words, during the labour-process. It is brought about by
labour; but how?
The labourer does not perform two operations at once, one in order to add
value to the cotton, the other in order to preserve the value of the means of
production, or, what amounts to the same thing, to transfer to the yarn, to the
product, the value of the cotton on which he works, and part of the value of the
spindle with which he works. But, by the very act of adding new value, he
preserves their former values. Since, however, the addition of new value to the
subject of his labour, and the preservation of its former value, are two
entirely distinct results, produced simultaneously by the labourer, during one
operation, it is plain that this two-fold nature of the result can be explained
only by the two-fold nature of his labour; at one and the same time, it must in
one character create value, and in another character preserve or transfer value.
Now, in what manner does every labourer add new labour and consequently new
value? Evidently, only by labouring productively in a
particular way; the spinner by spinning, the weaver by weaving, the smith by
forging. But, while thus incorporating labour generally, that is value, it is by
the particular form alone of the labour, by the spinning, the weaving and the
forging respectively, that the means of production, the cotton and spindle, the
yarn and loom, and the iron and anvil become constituent elements of the
product, of a new use-value. [1] Each
use-value disappears, but only to re-appear under a new form in a new use-value.
Now, we saw, when we were considering the process of creating value, that, if a
use-value be effectively consumed in the production of a new use-value, the
quantity of labour expended in the production of the consumed article, forms a
portion of the quantity of labour necessary to produce the new use-value; this
portion is therefore labour transferred from the means of production to the new
product. Hence, the labourer preserves the values of the consumed means of
production, or transfers them as portions of its value to the product, not by
virtue of his additional labour, abstractedly considered, but by virtue of the
particular useful character of that labour, by virtue of its special productive
form. In so far then as labour is such specific productive activity, in so far
as it is spinning, weaving, or forging, it raises, by mere contact, the means of
production from the dead, makes them living factors of the labour-process, and
combines with them to form the new products.
If the special productive labour of the workman were not spinning, he could
not convert the cotton into yarn, and therefore could not transfer the values of
the cotton and spindle to the yarn. Suppose the same workman were to change his
occupation to that of a joiner, he would still by a day’s labour add value to
the material he works upon. Consequently, we see, first, that the addition of
new value takes place not by virtue of his labour being spinning in particular,
or joinering in particular, but because it is labour in the abstract, a portion
of the total labour of society; and we see next, that the value added is of a
given definite amount, not because his labour has a special utility, but because
it is exerted for a definite time. On the one hand, then, it is by virtue of its
general character, as being expenditure of human labour-power in the abstract,
that spinning adds new value to the values of the cotton and the spindle; and on
the other hand, it is by virtue of its special character, as being a concrete,
useful process, that the same labour of spinning both transfers the values of
the means of production to the product, and preserves them in the product. Hence
at one and the same time there is produced a two-fold result.
By the simple addition of a certain quantity of labour, new value is added, and
by the quality of this added labour, the original values of the means of
production are preserved in the product. This two-fold effect, resulting from
the two-fold character of labour, may be traced in various phenomena.
Let us assume, that some invention enables the spinner to spin as much cotton
in 6 hours as he was able to spin before in 36 hours. His labour is now six
times as effective as it was, for the purposes of useful production. The product
of 6 hours’ work has increased six-fold, from 6 lbs. to 36 lbs. But now the 36
lbs. of cotton absorb only the same amount of labour as formerly did the 6 lbs.
One-sixth as much new labour is absorbed by each pound of cotton, and
consequently, the value added by the labour to each pound is only one-sixth of
what it formerly was. On the other hand, in the product, in the 36 lbs. of yarn,
the value transferred from the cotton is six times as great as before. By the 6
hours’ spinning, the value of the raw material preserved and transferred to
the product is six times as great as before, although the new value added by the
labour of the spinner to each pound of the very same raw material is one-sixth
what it was formerly. This shows that the two properties of labour, by virtue of
which it is enabled in one case to preserve value, and in the other to create
value, are essentially different. On the one hand, the longer the time necessary
to spin a given weight of cotton into yarn, the greater is the new value added
to the material; on the other hand, the greater the weight of the cotton spun in
a given time, the greater is the value preserved, by being transferred from it
to the product.
Let us now assume, that the productiveness of the spinner’s labour, instead
of varying, remains constant, that he therefore requires the same time as he
formerly did, to convert one pound of cotton into yarn, but that the
exchange-value of the cotton varies, either by rising to six times its former
value or falling to one-sixth of that value. In both these cases, the spinner
puts the same quantity of labour into a pound of cotton, and therefore adds as
much value, as he did before the change in the value: he also produces a given
weight of yarn in the same time as he did before. Nevertheless, the value that
he transfers from the cotton to the yarn is either one-sixth of what it was
before the variation, or, as the case may be, six times as much as before. The
same result occurs when the value of the instruments of labour rises or falls,
while their useful efficacy in the process remains unaltered.
Again, if the technical conditions of the spinning process remain unchanged,
and no change of value takes place in the means of production, the spinner
continues to consume in equal working-times equal quantities of raw material,
and equal quantities of machinery of unvarying value. The value that he
preserves in the product is directly
proportional to the new value that he adds to the product. In two weeks he
incorporates twice as much labour, and therefore twice as much value, as in one
week, and during the same time he consumes twice as much material, and wears out
twice as much machinery, of double the value in each case: he therefore
preserves, in the product of two weeks, twice as much value as in the product of
one week. So long as the conditions of production remain the same, the more
value the labourer adds by fresh labour, the more value he transfers and
preserves; but he does so merely because this addition of new value takes place
under conditions that have not varied and are independent of his own labour. Of
course, it may be said in one sense, that the labourer preserves old value
always in proportion to the quantity of new value that he adds. Whether the
value of cotton rise from one shilling to two shillings, or fall to sixpence,
the workman invariably preserves in the product of one hour only one half as
much value as he preserves in two hours. In like manner, if the productiveness
of his own labour varies by rising or falling, he will in one hour spin either
more or less cotton, as the case may be, than he did before, and will
consequently preserve in the product of one hour, more or less value of cotton;
but, all the same, he will preserve by two hours’ labour twice as much value
as he will by one.
Value exists only in articles of utility, in objects: we leave out of
consideration its purely symbolical representation by tokens. (Man himself,
viewed as the impersonation of labour-power, is a natural object, a thing,
although a living conscious thing, and labour is the manifestation of this power
residing in him.) If therefore an article loses its utility, it also loses its
value. The reason why means of production do not lose their value, at the same
time that they lose their use-value, is this: they lose in the labour-process
the original form of their use-value, only to assume in the product the form of
a new use-value. But, however important it may be to value, that it should have
some object of utility to embody itself in, yet it is a matter of complete
indifference what particular object serves this purpose; this we saw when
treating of the metamorphosis of commodities. Hence it follows that in the
labour-process the means of production transfer their value to the product only
so far as along with their use-value they lose also their exchange-value. They
give up to the product that value alone which they themselves lose as means of
production. But in this respect the material factors of the labour-process do
not all behave alike.
The coal burnt under the boiler vanishes without leaving a trace; so, too,
the tallow with which the axles of wheels are greased. Dye stuffs and other
auxiliary substances also vanish but re-appear as properties of the product. Raw
material forms the substance of the product, but only after it has changed its
form. Hence raw material and auxiliary
substances lose the characteristic form with which they are clothed on entering
the labour-process. It is otherwise with the instruments of labour. Tools,
machines, workshops, and vessels, are of use in the labour-process, only so long
as they retain their original shape, and are ready each morning to renew the
process with their shape unchanged. And just as during their lifetime, that is
to say, during the continued labour-process in which they serve, they retain
their shape independent of the product, so, too, they do after their death. The
corpses of machines, tools, workshops, &c., are always separate and distinct
from the product they helped to turn out. If we now consider the case of any
instrument of labour during the whole period of its service, from the day of its
entry into the workshop, till the day of its banishment into the lumber room, we
find that during this period its use-value has been completely consumed, and
therefore its exchange-value completely transferred to the product. For
instance, if a spinning machine lasts for 10 years, it is plain that during that
working period its total value is gradually transferred to the product of the 10
years. The lifetime of an instrument of labour, therefore, is spent in the
repetition of a greater or less number of similar operations. Its life may be
compared with that of a human being. Every day brings a man 24 hours nearer to
his grave: but how many days he has still to travel on that road, no man can
tell accurately by merely looking at him. This difficulty, however, does not
prevent life insurance offices from drawing, by means of the theory of averages,
very accurate, and at the same time very profitable conclusions. So it is with
the instruments of labour. It is known by experience how long on the average a
machine of a particular kind will last. Suppose its use-value in the labour-process
to last only six days. Then, on the average, it loses each day one-sixth of its
use-value, and therefore parts with one-sixth of its value to the daily product.
The wear and tear of all instruments, their daily loss of use-value, and the
corresponding quantity of value they part with to the product, are accordingly
calculated upon this basis.
It is thus strikingly clear, that means of production never transfer more
value to the product than they themselves lose during the labour-process by the
destruction of their own use-value. If such an instrument has no value to lose,
if, in other words, it is not the product of human labour, it transfers no value
to the product. It helps to create use-value without contributing to the
formation of exchange-value. In this class are included all means of production
supplied by Nature without human assistance, such as land, wind, water, metals
in situ, and timber in virgin forests.
Yet another interesting phenomenon here presents itself. Suppose a machine to
be worth £1,000, and to wear out in 1,000 days. Then one thousandth part of the
value of the machine is daily transferred to the
day’s product. At the same time, though with diminishing vitality, the machine
as a whole continues to take part in the labour-process. Thus it appears, that
one factor of the labour-process, a means of production, continually enters as a
whole into that process, while it enters into the process of the formation of
value by fractions only. The difference between the two processes is here
reflected in their material factors, by the same instrument of production taking
part as a whole in the labour-process, while at the same time as an element in
the formation of value, it enters only by fractions. [2]
On the other hand, a means of production may take part as a whole in the
formation of value, while into the labour-process it enters only bit by bit.
Suppose that in spinning cotton, the waste for every 115 lbs. used amounts to 15
lbs., which is converted, not into yarn, but into “devil’s dust.” Now,
although this 15 lbs. of cotton never becomes a constituent element of the yarn,
yet assuming this amount of waste to be normal and inevitable under average
conditions of spinning, its value is just as surely transferred to the value of
the yarn, as is the value of the 100 lbs. that form the substance of the yarn.
The use-value of 15 lbs. of cotton must vanish into dust, before 100 lbs. of
yarn can be made. The destruction of this cotton is therefore a necessary
condition in the production of the yarn. And because it is a necessary
condition, and for no other reason, the value of that cotton is transferred to
the product. The same holds good for every kind of refuse resulting from a
labour-process, so tar at least as such refuse cannot be further employed as a
means in the production of new and independent use-values.
Such an employment of refuse may be seen in the large machine works at
Manchester, where mountains of iron turnings are carted away to the foundry in
the evening, in order the next morning to re-appear in the workshops as solid
masses of iron.
We have seen that the means of production transfer value to the new product,
so far only as during the labour-process they lose value in the shape of their
old use-value. The maximum loss of value that they can suffer in the process, is
plainly limited by the amount of the original value with which they came into
the process, or in other words, by the labour-time necessary for their
production. Therefore, the means of production can never add more value to the
product than they themselves possess independently of the process in which they
assist. However useful a given kind of raw material, or a machine, or other
means of production may be, though it may cost £150, or, say, 500 days’
labour, yet it cannot, under any circumstances, add to the value of the product
more than £150. Its value is determined not by the labour-process into which it
enters as a means of production, but by that out of which it has issued as a
product. In the labour-process it only serves as a mere use-value, a thing with
useful properties, and could not, therefore, transfer any value to the product,
unless it possessed such value previously. [3]
While productive labour is changing the means of production into constituent
elements of a new product, their value undergoes a metempsychosis. It deserts
the consumed body, to occupy the newly created one. But this transmigration
takes place, as it were, behind the back of the labourer. He is unable to add
new labour, to create new value,
without at the same time preserving old values, and this, because the labour he
adds must be of a specific useful kind; and he cannot do work of a useful kind,
without employing products as the means of production of a new product, and
thereby transferring their value to the new product. The property therefore
which labour-power in action, living labour, possesses of preserving value, at
the same time that it adds it, is a gift of Nature which costs the labourer
nothing, but which is very advantageous to the capitalist inasmuch as it
preserves the existing value of his capital. [4]
So long as trade is good, the capitalist is too much absorbed in money-grubbing
to take notice of this gratuitous gift of labour. A violent interruption of the
labour-process by a crisis, makes him sensitively aware of it. [5]
As regards the means of production, what is really consumed is their
use-value, and the consumption of this use-value by labour results in the
product. There is no consumption of their value, [6]
and it would therefore be inaccurate to say that it is reproduced. It is rather
preserved; not by reason of any operation it undergoes itself in the process;
but because the article in which it originally exists, vanishes, it is true, but
vanishes into some other article. Hence, in the value of the product, there is a
reappearance of the value of the means of production, but there is, strictly
speaking, no reproduction of that value. That which is produced is a new
use-value in which the old exchange-value reappears. [7]
It is otherwise with the subjective factor of the labour-process, with labour-power
in action. While the labourer, by virtue of his labour being of a specialised
kind that has a special object, preserves and transfers to the product the value
of the means of production, he at the same time, by the mere act of working,
creates each instant an additional or new value. Suppose the process of
production to be stopped just when the workman has produced an equivalent for
the value of his own, labour-power, when, for example, by six hours’ labour,
he has added a value of three shillings. This value is the surplus, of the total
value of the product, over the portion of its value that is due to the means of
production. It is the only original bit of value formed during this process, the
only portion of the value of the product created by this process. Of course, we
do not forget that this new value only replaces the money advanced by the
capitalist in the purchase of the labour-power, and spent by the labourer on the
necessaries of life. With regard to the money spent, the new value is merely a
reproduction; but, nevertheless, it is an actual, and not, as in the case of the
value of the means of production, only an apparent, reproduction. The
substitution of one value for another, is here effected by the creation of new
value.
We know, however, from what has gone before, that the labour-process may
continue beyond the time necessary to reproduce and incorporate in the product a
mere equivalent for the value of the labour-power. Instead of the six hours that
are sufficient for the latter purpose, the process may continue for twelve
hours. The action of labour-power, therefore, not only reproduces its own value,
but produces value over and above it. This surplus-value is the difference
between the value of the product and the value of the elements consumed in the
formation of that product, in other words, of the means of production and the
labour-power.
By our explanation of the different parts played by the various factors of
the labour-process in the formation of the product’s value, we have, in fact,
disclosed the characters of the different functions allotted to the different
elements of capital in the process of expanding its own value. The surplus of
the total value of the product, over the sum of the values of its constituent
factors, is the surplus of the expanded capital over the capital originally
advanced. The means of production on the one hand, labour-power on the other,
are merely the different modes of existence which the value of the original
capital assumed when from being money it was transformed into the various
factors of the labour-process. That part of capital then, which is represented
by the means of production, by the raw material, auxiliary material and the
instruments of labour does not, in the process of production, undergo any
quantitative alteration of value. I therefore call it the constant part of
capital, or, more shortly, constant capital.
On the other hand, that part of capital, represented by labour-power, does,
in the process of production, undergo an alteration of value. It both reproduces
the equivalent of its own value, and also produces an excess, a surplus-value,
which may itself vary, may be more or less according to circumstances. This part
of capital is continually being transformed from a constant into a variable
magnitude. I therefore call it the variable part of capital, or, shortly, variable
capital. The same elements of capital which, from the point of view of the
labour-process, present themselves respectively as the objective and subjective
factors, as means of production and labour-power, present themselves, from the
point of view of the process of creating surplus-value, as constant and variable
capital.
The definition of constant capital given above by no means excludes the
possibility of a change of value in its elements. Suppose the price of cotton to
be one day sixpence a pound, and the next day, in consequence of a failure of
the cotton crop, a shilling a pound. Each pound of the cotton bought at
sixpence, and worked up after the rise in value, transfers to the product a
value of one shilling; and the cotton already spun before the rise, and perhaps
circulating in the market as yarn, likewise transfers to the product twice its,
original value. It is plain, however, that these changes of value are
independent of the increment or surplus-value added to the value of the cotton
by the spinning itself. If the old cotton had never been spun,
it could, after the rise, be resold at a shilling a pound instead of at
sixpence. Further, the fewer the processes the cotton has gone through, the more
certain is this result. We therefore find that speculators make it a rule when
such sudden changes in value occur, to speculate in that material on which the
least possible quantity of labour has been spent: to speculate, therefore, in
yarn rather than in cloth, in cotton itself, rather than in yarn. The change of
value in the case we have been considering, originates, not in the process in
which the cotton plays the part of a means of production, and in which it
therefore functions as constant capital, but in the process in which the cotton
itself is produced. The value of a commodity, it is true, is determined by the
quantity of labour contained in it, but this quantity is itself limited by
social conditions. If the time socially necessary for the production of any
commodity alters — and a given weight of cotton represents, after a bad
harvest, more labour than after a good one — all previously existing
commodities of the same class are affected, because they are, as it were, only
individuals of the species, [8] and
their value at any given time is measured by the labour socially necessary, i.e.,
by the labour necessary for their production under the then existing social
conditions.
As the value of the raw material may change, so, too, may that of the
instruments of labour, of the machinery, &c., employed in the process; and
consequently that portion of the value of the product transferred to it from
them, may also change. If in consequence of a new invention, machinery of a
particular kind can be produced by a diminished expenditure of labour, the old
machinery becomes depreciated more or less, and consequently transfers so much
less value to the product. But here again, the change in value originates
outside the process in which the machine is acting as a means of production.
Once engaged in this process, the machine cannot transfer more value than it
possesses apart from the process.
Just as a change in the value of the means of production, even after they
have commenced to take a part in the labour-process, does not alter their
character as constant capital, so, too, a change in the proportion of constant
to variable capital does not affect the respective functions of these two kinds
of capital. The technical conditions of the labour-process may be revolutionised
to such an extent, that where formerly ten men using ten implements of small
value worked up a relatively small quantity of raw material, one man may now,
with the aid of one expensive machine, work up one hundred times as much raw
material. In the latter case we have an enormous increase in the constant
capital, that is represented by the total value of the means of production used,
and at the same time a great reduction in the variable capital, invested in
labour-power. Such a revolution, however, alters only the quantitative relation
between the constant and the variable capital, or the proportions in which the
total capital is split up into its constant and variable constituents; it has
not in the least degree affected the essential difference between the two.
Footnotes
[1]
“Labour gives a new creation for one extinguished.” “An Essay on the Polit.
Econ. of Nations,” London, 1821, p. 13.)
[2]
The subject of repairs of the implements of labour does not concern us here. A
machine that is undergoing repair, no longer plays the part of an instrument,
but that of a subject of labour. Work is no longer done with it, but upon it. It
is quite permissible for our purpose to assume, that the labour expended on the
repairs of instruments is included in the labour necessary for their original
production. But in the text we deal with that wear and tear, which no doctor can
cure, and which little by little brings about death, with “that kind of wear
which cannot be repaired from time to time, and which, in the case of a knife,
would ultimately reduce it to a state in which the cutler would say of it, it is
not worth a new blade.” We have shewn in the text, that a machine takes part
in every labour-process as an integral machine, but that into the simultaneous
process of creating value it enters only bit by bit. How great then is the
confusion of ideas exhibited in the following extract! “Mr. Ricardo says a
portion of the labour of the engineer in making [stocking] machines” is
contained for example in the value of a pair of stockings. “Yet the total
labour, that produced each single pair of stockings ... includes the whole
labour of the engineer, not a portion; for one machine makes many pairs, and
none of those pairs could have been done without any part of the machine.”
“Obs. on Certain Verbal Disputes in Pol. Econ., Particularly Relating to
Value,” p. 54. The author, an uncommonly self-satisfied wiseacre, is right in
his confusion and therefore in his contention, to this extent only, that neither
Ricardo nor any other economist, before or since him, has accurately
distinguished the two aspects of labour, and still less, therefore, the part
played by it under each of these aspects in the formation of value.
[3]
From this we may judge of the absurdity of J. B. Say, who pretends to account
for surplus-value (Interest, Profit, Rent), by the “services productifs”
which the means of production, soil, instruments, and raw material, render in
the labour-process by means of their use-values. Mr. Wm. Roscher who seldom
loses an occasion of registering, in black and white, ingenious apologetic
fancies, records the following specimen: - “J. B. Say (Traité, t. 1, ch. 4)
very truly remarks: the value produced by an oil mill, after deduction of all
costs, is something new, something quite different from the labour by which the
oil mill itself was erected.” (l.c., p. 82, note.) Very true, Mr. Professor!
the oil produced by the oil mill is indeed something very different from the
labour expended in constructing the mill! By value, Mr. Roscher understands such
stuff as “oil,” because oil has value, notwithstanding that “Nature”
produces petroleum, though relatively “in small quantities,” a fact to which
he seems to refer in his further observation: “It (Nature) produces scarcely
any exchange-value.” Mr. Roscher’s “Nature” and the exchange-value it
produces are rather like the foolish virgin who admitted indeed that she had had
a child, but “it was such a little one.” This “savant sérieux” in
continuation remarks: “Ricardo’s school is in the habit of including capital
as accumulated labour under the head of labour. This is unskilful work, because,
indeed, the owner of capital, after all, does something more than the merely
creating and preserving of the same: namely, the abstention from the enjoyment
of it, for which he demands, e.g., interest.” (l.c.) How very
“skilful” is this “anatomico-physiological method” of Political Economy,
which, “indeed,” converts a mere desire “after all” into a source of
value.
[4]
“Of all the instruments of the farmers’ trade, the labour of man ... is that
on which he is most to rely for the repayment of his capital. The other two ...
the working stock of the cattle and the ... carts, ploughs, spades, and so
forth, without a given portion of the first, are nothing at all.” (Edmund
Burke: “Thoughts and Details on Scarcity, originally presented to the Right
Hon. W. Pitt, in the month of November 1795,” Edit. London, 1800, p. 10.)
[5]
In The Times of 26th November, 1862, a manufacturer, whose mill
employed 800 hands, and consumed, on the average, 150 bales of East Indian, or
130 bales of American cotton, complains, in doleful manner, of the standing
expenses of his factory when not working. He estimates them at £6,000 a year.
Among them are a number of items that do not concern us here, such as rent,
rates, and taxes, insurance, salaries of the manager, book-keeper, engineer, and
others. Then he reckons £150 for coal used to heat the mill occasionally, and
run the engine now and then. Besides this, he includes the wages of the people
employed at odd times to keep the machinery in working order. Lastly, he puts
down £1,200 for depreciation of machinery, because “the weather and the
natural principle of decay do not suspend their operations because the
steam-engine ceases to revolve.” He says, emphatically, he does not estimate
his depreciation at more than the small sum of £1,200, because his machinery is
already nearly worn out.
[6]
“Productive consumption ... where the consumption of a commodity is a part of
the process of production. ... In these instances there is no consumption of
value.” (S. P. Newman, l.c., p. 296.)
[7]
In an American compendium that has gone through, perhaps, 20 editions, this
passage occurs: “It matters not in what form capital re-appears;” then after
a lengthy enumeration of all the possible ingredients of production whose value
re-appears in the product, the passage concludes thus: “The various kinds of
food, clothing, and shelter, necessary for the existence and comfort of the
human being, are also changed. They are consumed from time to time, and their
value re-appears in that new vigour imparted to his body and mind, forming fresh
capital, to be employed again in the work of production.” (F. Wayland, l.c.,
pp. 31, 32.) Without noticing any other oddities, it suffices to observe, that
what re-appears in the fresh vigour, is not the bread’s price, but its
bloodforming substances. What, on the other hand, re-appears in the value of
that vigour, is not the means of subsistence, but their value. The same
necessaries of life, at half the price, would form just as much muscle and bone,
just as much vigour, but not vigour of the same value. This confusion of
“value” and “vigour” coupled with our author’s pharisaical
indefiniteness, mark an attempt, futile for all that, to thrash out an
explanation of surplus-value from a mere re-appearance of pre-existing values.
[8]
“Toutes les productions d’un même — genre ne forment proprement qu’une
masse, dont le prix se détermine en général et sans égard aux circonstances
particulières.” (Le Trosne, 1. c., p. 893.) [“Properly speaking, all
products of the same kind form a single mass, and their price is determined in
general and without regard to particular circumstances.”]
Transcribed by Zodiac
Html Markup by Stephen Baird (1999)
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